Three Berry Buckle

I’m not going to lie, I considered a lot of puns to title this post, things like “buckle up,” or “get ready to loosen your...” but I ultimately decided against it. Not that I don’t love a good (or bad) pun, as the case may be, but memorializing it seemed like perhaps a bad idea, and so here we are.

If you’ve never had a buckle before, stop what you’re doing (ok, stop once you’re done reading this post and the recipe), and go make a buckle. A buckle is sort of a cross between a cobbler, a cake, a pie, and maybe a crisp. It takes all of the best elements of each, resulting in a soft, super moist cake. I would say it’s almost pudding like, but that really doesn’t do it justice. The buckle is topped with sort of a crispy sugar crust, making it even better.

The recipe I use is adapted from an old Gourmet. My mom has actually been making it for about as long as I can remember. Her advice when I went to make it was this “Bad fruit = bad buckle,” which is absolutely true. The original recipe calls for nectarines and blueberries, but almost anything will work. Ideally you want something with a sort of concentrated flavor. Most stone fruits (nectarines, peaches, etc) are great, as are all kinds of berries. I’ve never tried it with apples or pears, but I bet they would work in a pinch. One of the reviewers on epicurious mentioned having made one with strawberries and rhubarb. Given the early spring season, I went the berry route, and made one with strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries, which are always a solid choice if you can find good ones.

What I can say for sure is that the people I made this for couldn’t stop telling me how good it was. Maybe they were just being polite, but I suspect otherwise...

Fruit Buckle

Makes 9 x 13 pan worth

For filling:

1 cup + 2 T (2 ¼ sticks) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup + 2 T sugar

1 ½ tsp vanilla

3/8 tsp baking powder

2 cups AP flour

¾ tsp salt

4 large eggs

4-5 cups mixed fruit

For topping:

¾ stick COLD unsalted butter, cut into chunks

¾ cups sugar

½ cup AP flour

¾ tsp cinnamon

¾ tsp nutmeg

1. Preheat oven to 350. Butter a 9x13 cake pan or pyrex baking dish.

2. Start by making the topping. In the bowl of a food processor, briefly pulse together the flour, sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Add the cold butter, and pulse until mixture resembles a coarse grain. Put the topping in the fridge while you make the rest of the buckle.

3. In a large bowl (or the bowl of a standing mixer) cream together the butter and the sugar until fluffy. Beat in vanilla.

4. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.

5. With the mixer on medium speed, alternate adding the flour, and the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

6. Fold in the fruit. Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Sprinkle the topping liberally over the top of the cake. It might look like you’re putting it on thickly, but remember it melts in the oven, the more you add, the ticker and crunchier a crust you get.

7. Bake for 45-50 minutes, or until the cake is golden on top, and the fruit juice is bubbling up the sides. Check it as you’re going, and if it looks like the top is burning, tent it with tinfoil.

8. Serve warm, with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream.

Cookie Dough Cake and Turning Two

It’s the second anniversary of my creating this blog and it’s been an interesting experience running the site for the past two years. Originally my intention was at most to document for my own purposes and reference the things I had made. But having the blog changed the way I cook and bake. The need for posts, especially early on, drove me to more cooking and baking that I might otherwise do. It also drove me to push my own limits, if only to keep what I had to write about interesting. It’s also encouraged me to experiment. I can’t post about recipes I’ve made before, and so I have to keep pushing for new things. While this means that I don’t return too much (there are a few, like the tiramisu cupcakes, or the double pumpkin cupcakes, that I will come back to over and over), it also means I keep looking for new things to try. It also just seems boring to make other people’s recipes, I can review them I suppose, and sometimes I do, but at the same time I feel like that’s not adding anything. I’d rather try to make a snickers bar cupcake, or one with candied prosciutto in it, than just making the same old thing. And while I am far from the most creative person out there, I like to at least think I’ve done a few things that if nothing else, no one else has bothered doing, at least in the same way I have.

Interestingly, running the blog has also been an interesting way for me to catalogue my own life. A friend of mine recently went through the blog and made a slideshow of all of the best pictures on the website (I know they’re not all winners). I remembered each baked good, both what I was seeing, as well as what I had made them for, the various parties, potlucks, events, and tribulations of law school over the past two years since starting Amicus Cupcake. And while I don’t tend to add the kinds of persona vignettes that many other bloggers do, for me at least the pictures and the recipes act as triggers of memory far more extensive than what is written.

I know that of course my blogging has slowed down lately. When I was celebrating my 1 year blogoversary, I was also celebrating my 100^th post. Now I’m only remarking my 136^th, certainly a nearly 2/3 reduction in postings is noteworthy, but it’s just been necessitated by my life. When I do repeat recipes, I don’t have anything to write. Sometimes I don’t have time to take pictures between baking and serving, which means no blog posting. Law school also just takes a lot of time and energy, and I often just don’t feel like writing up my recipes. Last, and probably most important, has been a change in the way I bake. In an effort to eat healthier I’ve instituted personal rules on when I bake, most notably I only bake when I have a good reason, and a way to get rid of it (without eating it all myself). The consequence is less baking, but a healthier me. I think it’s been a fair tradeoff.

Now on to the cake! Earlier this month Annie of Annie’s Eats posted a recipe for cookie dough cupcakes. I’m always a sucker for cookie dough, and so I decided to turn it into a layer cake. The recipe, however, looked a little off to me, and so I went to Bakewise and made a few changes. Namely I reduced the amount of butter (3 sticks seem like a lot for 2 cake layers), reducing the milk, and increasing the sugar. As a result, I can’t actually comment on Annie’s version of the recipe.

That disclaimer aside, I thought this cake was really good, but very dense and rich. The layers of cake were thick, and had a texture that reminded me of pound cake. The edges of the cake were a little overcooked, making the cake harder to cut through, but it didn’t mess up the taste. I would say overall the layers reminded me of cookies. The cookie dough filling itself was great. At first I thought that it tasted too much like sweetened condensed milk, but after a night in the fridge the tastes mellowed and it made an excellent cookie dough substitute. As for the frosting, I omitted the flour to make it lighter, and also took out some of the sugar, because I tend to think buttercreams just have too much sugar in them. I thought the light frosting went well with the heavier cake and filling though.

Cookie Dough Cake

Makes 2 eight inch cake layers

1 ¼ cups (2.5 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1 2/3 cups light brown sugar, packed

4 large eggs

2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. baking soda

¼ tsp. salt

3/4 cup milk

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 cup chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350. Butter two 8 inch cake pans, line with parchment, and butter the parchment. Whisk the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda together and set aside.

2. Cream together the butter and brown sugar in the bowl of a standing mixer on medium speed, until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.

3. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Scrape down the sides as necessary. In a measuring cup combine the milk and the vanilla.

4. Reduce the mixer speed to slow. Add 1/3 of the flour mixture to the butter, followed by half of the milk. Continue alternating between the two, ending with the dry ingredients

5. Stir in the chocolate chips with a spatula. Divide the dough into the prepared cake pans, level off the tops of the cake batter.

6. Bake the cake layers for 30 to 32 minutes, until layers are golden on top, pulling away from the sides, and a tester comes out clean. The cakes will probably dome, mine did.

7. Remove to cooling racks and let cool. Invert to remove from pans once cooled.

Cookie Dough Filling

This makes more than enough. You can use the extra to make decorations, cookie dough truffles, or do like me and just eat it with a spoon

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature

¾ cup light brown sugar, packed

2 ¼ cups AP flour

14 oz. (1 can) sweetened condensed milk

1 tsp. vanilla extract

½ cup mini chocolate chips

1. In the bowl of a standing mixer, cream together the butter and sugar until fluffy.

2. Beat in the flour, sweetened condensed milk, and vanilla until combined

3. Stir in the chocolate chips. Transfer dough to a bowl, cover in plastic wrap, and put in the fridge for several hours to firm up, or overnight

Brown sugar buttercream

This made just barely enough for me to cover the outside of the cake

1 ½ cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature

¾ cup light brown sugar, packed

2 cups powdered sugar

1 T milk

2 ½ tsp vanilla extract

Pinch salt

1. Cream together the butter and the brown sugar until smooth. Add the powdered sugar, and beat until smooth.

2. Add the milk, vanilla, and salt and beat until combined. Add more milk (to loosen) or powdered sugar (to stiffen) to adjust the consistency as you desire.

Assembly

Cake layers

Cookie Dough Filling

Brown Sugar Buttercream

Mini Chocolate Chips

1. Line an 8 inch cake pan with plastic wrap. Press some of the cookie dough filling into the pan, until you have a disk that is 8 inches across, and ½ inch to 1 inch thick. Place in the freezer for 5-10 minutes

2. Level off the tops of the cakes, so that they are flat. Place the first layer cut side up on your serving plate.

3. Remove the cookie dough from the freezer. Remove it from the cake pan, and peel off the plastic wrap. Place the cookie dough disk upside down (flat side up) on the cake layer. If it sinks a little in the middle (mine bowed a bit), you can work the dough in your hands till it becomes putty-like, and push it into the disk to make it level.

4. Put the second cake layer on top, cut side down. Press the sides of the cake, to make sure the cookie dough layer is flush with the cake.

5. Spread about a quarter of the frosting on the cake as the crumb coat, Place in the fridge for 20 minutes.

6. Add the remaining frosting to the cake, spread evenly around the outside of the cake. Stud the cake with mini chocolate chips for decoration. Refrigerate the cake until ready to serve.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Mousse Cake

So, I’ve become negligent about posting again. Unfortunately it’s been busy lately. Fortunately though, this cake is an excellent return. It is, admittedly, pretty much the cake version of a cupcake I made over the summer. But that didn’t stop it from being excellent. I also used the “Deep Dark Chocolate Cake” recipe from bakewise as the cake, which was an excellent choice. Very chocolaty and moist. This recipe makes more peanut butter mousse than I needed, but I imagine you can find a creative use for the extra. Special thanks, as always, go to my friend Jessica, who helped me a great deal in making this cake (particularly by making the actual cake part).

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Mousse Cake

Chocolate Cake Layers

Makes 3, 8 inch layers

4 cups + 2 T sugar

1 tsp salt

1 cup + 2 T Dutch Process Cocoa Powder

1 ½ tsp baking soda

1 ½ cup water

1 ½ cup canola oil

3 tsp vanilla extract

2 ½ + 2 T Spooned and Leveled AP flour

6 large egg yolks

3 large eggs

3/8 cup buttermilk

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously butter cake pans, line with parchment, and butter the parchment.

2. In a heavy saucepan stir together the sugar, salt, cocoa, and baking soda. Bring the water to a boil, stirring constantly, pour the water slowly into the cocoa mixture. Stir the mixture. Place on the heat and bring back to a boil. Turn off and allow to stand for 10 minutes.

3. Pour the cocoa mixture into a large mixing bowl, add the oil and vanilla and beat on low speed for 10 seconds. Still on low speed add the flour, and then quickly add the eggs, yolks, and buttermilk. Pour the batter into the prepared pans, filling about 2/3 full. If you have extra, make them into cupcakes (that’s what I did).

4. Bake for about 30 minutes, until the cake is set, pulls away from the sides of the pan, and a tester comes out clean. Let cool in the pans for 10 minutes, and then invert onto cooling racks to cool completely.

Peanut-Butter Mousse

2 cups creamy peanut butter (not natural)

2 8oz package cream cheese, room temperature

2 cup powdered sugar

2 T vanilla

2 cup chilled whipping cream

1. Beat the peanut butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla together until smooth and well blended.

2. Using clean, chilled beaters, and a chilled bowl, beat the cream to stiff peaks.

3. Fold ¼ of the whipped cream into the peanut butter mixture. Fold in the remaining whipped cream ¼ at a time. Fold until smooth and well mixed. Chill in the fridge until ready to use.

Peanut-butter Ganache

18 oz. dark chocolate, chopped

1 cup creamy peanut butter

2 cups heavy cream

1. Put the peanut butter and chocolate in a bowl.

2. Heat the heavy cream to a simmer, pour over the chocolate

3. Let the cream sit for a minute, then stir until thoroughly mixed. Let the ganache cool until it thickens enough to be spreadable.

Assembly

Place one layer flat side down. Spread about 2 cups of the peanut butter mousse on the cake, all the way to the edge. Place the most imperfect layer in the middle. Spread another 2 cups of peanut butter mousse on the cake. Place the final layer on top, flat side up. Pour about half the ganache over the cake, use an offset spatula to spread it all around the top and sides covering all of the cake. Once this layer of ganache, reheat the remainder just until it flows, and pour it over the cake. I found this ganache was too thick to just let it run down the cake, so I still had to use a spatula to spread it all around. I used a little extra peanut butter mousse to do the decorations.

For My Bonnemaman - a Mocha Genoise

When I was young, my bonnemaman (french for grandmother) would make a mocha cake whenever my parents and I would come to visit. Unlike American Mocha, the traditional European (or maybe just Belgian) is just coffee flavored. It was an excellent cake, that both my parents and I have very fond memories of. Unfortunately, no one ever got the recipe from my grandmother. We do, however, know some of the elements. The frosting was a coffee flavored buttercream, which she added texture to by including granulated sugar. The trouble with this is that most buttercreams can hold very little liquid, and so just adding coffee to a buttercream won’t make a frosting, and extracts don’t provide the same flavor. My grandmother also had a philosophy that when the frosting contained as much fat as hers did, the cake shouldn’t contain any fat, and so she used a genoise with no butter added to it. Based on this I set about trying to construct a version of the recipe. Finding a genoise recipe was easy, I used the one from Bakewise. The frosting recipe was more complicated, but then my mother found a recipe for a Flemish crème-anglaise based coffee buttercream, which she sent to me. Armed with these two recipes I decided to take a shot at it. Of course, I have nothing to do with a full cake, so instead I made the cake in a jelly roll pan, and turned it into petit-fours. I made 1 ½ times the genoise recipe, and half the frosting recipe, which ended up with my making way too much cake, and way too little frosting. My genoise was also far from perfect, the first attempt failed utterly (I underbeat it massively), and the second, while a vast improvement, was far from perfect (the flour was not evenly mixed). I have reprinted the recipes here in the proportions I made them, you might want to adjust accordingly (this is also why a lot of the measures in the cake are strange).

So how did they turn out? Pretty good I would say. The cake itself definitely reminded me of my grandmothers, though it wasn’t quite there. I thought the frosting was a little too buttery, but this might have been because the butter ended up far too soft when I put it in, and so it might not have fluffed up as much as it would have otherwise. I also didn’t add any granulated sugar to the frosting, and it really could have used that added texture, as both the frosting and cake are very tender. I did add espresso beans to the tops of the cakes, which added some much needed contrast.

Simple Genoise

Makes one 11 x 17 jelly roll pan (at least, mine was probably overfilled)

9 large eggs, in the shells 

¾ cup plus 1 ½ T sugar, divided 

1 cup plus 2 T cake flour, spooned and leveled 

¼ cup plus 1 ½ tsp cornstarch 

1/8 tsp pinch of salt 

1 ½ tsp vanilla

1. Arrange shelf in the lower third of the oven. Preheat to 350 degrees. Grease and flour an 11 x 17 inch jelly roll pan. Line with parchment, grease the parchment

2. Put the eggs, in their shells, in a bowl and cover with very hot water. Mix together the flour, the 1 ½ T sugar, the cornstarch, and the salt.

3. Put two inches of water into a skillet over medium heat. Separate three of the eggs, placing the yolks in the bowl of your mixer. Add the remaining 6 eggs and the remaining ¾ cup sugar. Place the mixing bowl into the skillet of water. Whisk the mixture constantly until it reaches between 86 and 9 degrees.

4. Attach the bowl to a mixer set with the whisk attachment. Beat on high for two minutes, and then reduce speed to medium and beat for another 10 minutes. Mixture should be thick and foamy, and should fall in thick ribbons from the whisk.

5. Sift ¼ of the flour mixture over the egg mixture. Gently fold the flour into the egg, repeat in 4 to 5 batches until all of the flour is incorporated. Gently fold in the vanilla.

6. Pour the genoise batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until puffed and golden. The center should spring back to the touch. After removing the cake run a knife around the edges so the cake can settle.

Coffee Buttercream

1/3 cup espresso coffee beans 

1/2 Cup milk 

3/4 cups granulated sugar 

4 large egg yolks, at room temp 

1 1/3 cups unsalted butter, softened

1. Coarsely crush the espresso bean in a mortar and pestle processing in small batches so that none of the coffee is crushed finely. Combine the crushed espresso beans with the milk in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Remove from the heat, cover and let steep for 10 minutes. Strain through fine sieve, pressing down on the beans to extract as much milk as possible. You should have about 1/3 of espresso-flavored milk. If necessary at a little milk to get back up to 1/3 cup. Discard the coffee grounds and rinse out eh sieve so it will be ready to use again for straining the custard.

2. Combine the espresso-flavored milk with 2 T of the sugar in a heavy 1 quart saucepan and bring to a simmer.

3. Meanwhile, combine the egg yolks with the remaining sugar in a mixing bowl and beat with a wire whisk until smooth and lemon-colored. Pour in about half of the hot milk, whisking constantly. Pour this mixture back into the saucepan and stir until thoroughly blended.

4.* Place the saucepan over medium heat and stirring constantly with a wooden spatula, stirring the custard almost to a simmer. Reduce the heat to low and cook, stirring constantly with the spatula until the custard thickens and coats the spatula heavily. (When you draw a line across the back of the custard-coated spatula with your fingertip, the custard should not flow back over the line). Reduce the heat to the lowest possible setting (moving the saucepan to the side of the burner as needed) and keep the mixture hot, again stirring constantly, for 4 minutes to pasteurize it. – This is the original instruction, and I hate instructions like this, I cooked mine to 175 degrees, which was nice and thick, but not overdone.

5. Immediately strain the custard through the fine sieve into the bowl of the mixer. Beat the custard with the wire whip at medium speed until is light and cool. This is the buttercream base.

6. Gradually beat in the softened butter at medium speed, using the flat beater if  your mixer has one. When all of the butter has been added, beat the buttercream vigorously to make it as light as possible.

7. Use the butter cream right away.

Assembly

Cake 

Buttercream 

Espresso beans

1. Cut the cake into  1 x 2 inch rectangles. Slice each rectangle of cake in half horizontally (so that you now have two layers).

2. Generously put about a tablespoon of frosting between the two layers. Press together. Use a butter knife to spread a thin layer of butter cream over the outside of the cake (this is the crumb coat, it doesn’t need to look great). Refrigerate the cakes until firm, which will take several hours, or place in the freezer for about 10 minutes.

3. When the crumb coat is firm, use a butter knife or offset spatula to apply a second layer of frosting. I’m not great at this, so have no tips here.

4. Top the completed petit-fours with espresso beans, or other decorations.

Celebrating the Blogoversary with a Chocolate Cake and a Guest

Here it is, the promised second post celebrating my blogoversary. As mentioned, this post was going to be a little different: It is my first posting by a guest blogger! The guest is my good friend, and frequent assisster, Jess, who kindly volunteered to make this cake for me to celebrate. And Jess, I can tell you, people were not just being polite, this is a truly excellent cake! Thanks again for making it for me, and for all the assistance you've given me on the various recipes throughout this blog.

When amicus cupake mentioned to me that his blog was coming up on its first anniversary and that the anniversary would coincide with the 100^th post on his blog, I begged him to allow me to make a cake to celebrate.  Ever since this blog started he has made the desert for every party that I can remember.  This is wonderful, as his deserts are always divine, but it is also sad because it means I seldom get the chance to bake for anyone.  Accordingly, when this anniversary rolled around, I saw my opportunity and I seized it.  The cake was served to amicus and a group of friends after we tried out a new dinner spot.  The combination of friends, food, and cake made for an excellent evening.

In deciding what to make I knew I needed something that is celebratory (chocolate), something to please a crowd (chocolate), and something that amicus would enjoy (chocolate).  When I hit on a recipe for Chocolate Crunch Layer Cake with Milk Chocolate Frosting on epicurious.com, I knew I was on the right track.  I really didn’t make any modification to the recipe, except that I prepared the dry and the wet ingredients before I melted the chocolate and that I greased the pans with Pam rather than bothering with waxed paper and butter.  The cake seemed to be a hit, or at least everyone was very polite!  

Cake

• 4 ounces unsweetened chocolate
  
• 1/2 cup hot water
  
• 1 3/4 cups cake flour 
  
• 1 teaspoon baking soda 
  
• 1/2 teaspoon salt 
  
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature 
  
• 1 3/4 cups sugar 
  
• 3 large eggs, room temperature 
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 
• 2/3 cup whole milk

Frosting

• 1 1/4 cups whipping cream
• 1/4 cup light corn syrup
• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
• 1 pound milk chocolate, chopped

Assembly

• 4 1.4-ounce chocolate-covered English toffee bars (such as Heath Bars or Skor), cut into 1/4-inch dice
  
• 7 ounces milk chocolate (I used one large Heresy’s bar and one normal sized bar)
  

Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 350°F. Grease two 9-inch-diameter cake pans with 1 3/4-inch-high sides.  Combine chocolate and 1/2 cup hot water in small saucepan. Stir over low heat until melted and smooth. Cool to lukewarm, stirring often.

Whisk flour, baking soda and salt in medium bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat butter in large bowl until fluffy. Gradually beat in sugar. Beat in eggs 1 at a time, then vanilla extract. Beat in chocolate mixture. Add flour mixture in 3 additions alternately with milk in 2 additions, beating just to blend after each addition. Divide batter equally between pans. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center comes out clean and cake just begins to pull away from sides of pan, about 35 minutes. Cool cakes in pans on racks 5 minutes. Cut around pan sides. Turn cakes out onto racks; peel off waxed paper. Cool cakes completely.

Combine cream, corn syrup and butter in heavy large saucepan. Whisk over medium heat until mixture begins to simmer. Add chopped chocolate. Reduce heat to low and whisk until frosting is smooth, about 1 minute; transfer to large bowl.

Fill another large bowl with ice. Set bottom of bowl with frosting atop ice. Whisk until frosting is cool and begins to thicken, about 8 minutes. Place bowl of frosting on work surface. Using electric mixer, beat until color lightens and just until frosting becomes thick enough to hold peaks when beaters are lifted, about 2 minutes (frosting will continue to thicken as it stands).

Place 1 cake layer, flat side up, on 8-inch-diameter tart pan bottom or cardboard round. If desired, place pan bottom with cake atop 8-inch-diameter cake pan to make simple decorating stand. Top layer with 1 1/2 cups frosting, spreading to edge. Sprinkle evenly with diced toffee. Top with second cake layer, flat side down; press slightly to adhere. Spread thin layer of frosting over top and sides of cake to seal and set crumbs. Spread remaining frosting over top and sides of cake (if frosting becomes stiff, stir gently with spatula to loosen).

Stand chocolate bar on 1 short end. Using vegetable peeler and starting at top edge of 1 side, run peeler down length of bar (chocolate will come away from side of chocolate bar in curls). Pile chocolate curls atop cake. Chill at least 2 hours. (Can be made 2 days ahead. Cover with cake dome and keep chilled. Let stand at room temperature 1 hour before serving.) 

A Dessert to Share

Sorry about the long delay, but it's a busy season in law school. It was my friend Joe's 30^th birthday the other day, and I volunteered to make the cake with the help of my friend Jessica. I was told Joe's favorite kinds of cake were cheesecake, and chocolate cake. Being an indecisive person, I decided that rather than choosing one, I would combine the two. The obvious choice was a brownie bottomed cheesecake. Some quick googling turned up this recipe for a brownie bottomed peanut butter cheesecake. This cheesecake was amazing, good enough that people cursed me out when they felt compelled to go back for more. Which is why this is a cheesecake to share, so that you won't end up eating the whole thing. This recipe does make more cheesecake batter than is needed, so I made a second smaller cheesecake with the extra. I tried to make a pretzel crust for it, but I didn't like it, so I didn't bother to include the recipe for it.

Peanut Butter Cup Brownie Bottom Cheesecake

Brownie Crust

6 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1-1/4 cups sugar
1 Tbsp vanilla extract (I used Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla)
2 eggs
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips 

1 cup peanut butter chips

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease 9-inch springform pan with butter.

2. Stir together butter, sugar and vanilla in large bowl with spoon or wire whisk. Add eggs; stir until well blended. Stir in flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt; blend well. Spread in prepared pan.

3. Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until brownie begins to pull away from side of pan. Meanwhile make cheesecake layer (see below).

4. Immediately after removing brownie from oven, sprinkle milk chocolate chips, peanut butter chips and peanut butter cups over brownie surface. Spoon cheesecake mixture over chips. Turn down oven 325°.

Cheesecake Filling
2 lbs cream cheese, softened
5 eggs, at room temperature
1-1/2 cups firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup smooth peanut butter (not natural-style)
1/2 cups whipping cream
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
1 cup mini peanut butter cups*

*These were chocolate chip sized peanut butter cups I got from Trader Joes, if you can’t find them, skip them

1. Beat cream cheese in bowl of electric mixer until smooth.

2. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add sugar, peanut butter and cream; mix until smooth.

3. Stir in vanilla and mini peanut butter cups.

4. Pour filling into prepared crust. (I poured the rest off into a smaller springform pan)

5. Double-wrap springform pan with aluminum foil to prevent water seeping in. Place springform pan into a larger baking pan. Pour hot water into the larger pan so that the water comes 1 inch up the sides of the springform pan. (This is easiest to do once you have already moved the pan into the oven, that way you don’t have to try to move a pan full of water).

6. Bake at 325 degrees 1-1/2 hours, or until firm and lightly browned.

7. Remove from the oven and allow to cool on a wire rack for one hour.

8. Run a knife along the edge of the cake to loosen it from the pan somewhat.

9. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours before decorating. I tend to make cheesecakes a day ahead to let things set.

Decoration

¼ cup whipping cream 

½ cup chocolate chips 

½ cup peanut butter chips

1. Place all ingredients into a microwave safe bowl. Microwave on medium power in 30 second bursts, whisking after each, until mixture is fully combined.

2. Let the ganache sit out until it has firmed up enough to pipe. Use to decorate the cake as you choose.

Another Pound Cake

My softball team was having a cookout on Sunday, so I decided I would make pound cake. I’ve made Dorie Greenspan’s Perfect Pound cake before, so this time I thought I would try the Pound Cake Recipe from The Best Recipe. I thought that resulting pound cake was excellent, moist, good crumb, and nicely dense. I did think it could have used a little more flavor, and I think upping the vanilla would be a good idea, or switching to vanilla paste. I would definitely rate this pound cake highly though.

The Best Recipe Pound cake

Makes 1 9 x 5 loaf

½ pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened 

1 1/3 cups sugar 

3 large eggs, plus 3 large yolks, room temperature 

1 ½ tsp vanilla extract 

1 ½ tsp water 

½ tsp salt 

1 ½ cups cake flour

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease a 9 x 5 x 3 loaf pan, line it with parchment paper. Place butter in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium-high until butter is smooth and shiny, about one minute. With the machine still on, gradually add the sugar over about 30 seconds. Continue beating the mixture until light and fluffy, about 4 to 5 minutes.

2. Mix the eggs, yolks, vanilla and water together in a measuring cup. With the mixer still on pour the egg mixture into the butter in a very slow stream. Beat in the salt.

3. Sift ½ cup of flour over the batter and fold it gently in. Repeat two more times until flour is fully incorporated.

4. Scrape batter into prepared baking dish. Bake for 70 to 80 minutes, until cake is golden and a cake tester inserted into a center comes out clean. Remove cake from the pan, let cool.

A Christmas Tradition

Not every year, but many years, my mom makes us a Buche de Noel (Yule Log) for Christmas Eve. It is a process that usually takes her a fair amount of time, and often involves her cursing like a sailor. Well, this year, with my new found blog and baking habit, I thought I would take a crack at it. A friend of mine was having a holiday party, and I thought it would be the perfect thing to bring along. I approached the recipe with some trepidation, as I had only ever tried one other roll cake, and it did not turn out well.  I used the recipe from The Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum, which deviated in many ways from a traditional buche, which has a genoise cake and buttercream filling. Her buche instead uses a flourless soufflé cake, and is filled with whipped cream, then covered in ganache. Having no experience, and wanting something easy to start with (her recipe was very straightforward), I decided to use her suggestions, and, I was very happy with the results. This cake is not very sweet in the way a traditional American cake often is. Apart from the meringue mushrooms there was only about 1/3 of a cup of sugar in this whole recipe (excluding the sugar already in the chocolate). However, the tastes in the cake come together really well, and the lack of sweetness didn’t bother me. If anything it really brings out the richness of the chocolate.

I adorned my cake with meringue mushrooms, which no buche is complete without. If you want additional adornment, my mother used to make a simple green frosting that she would use to pipe vines and leaves. I was too lazy to go to that much trouble. The Cake Bible also suggests marzipan leaves and meringue pine needles, both of which struck me as too much work.

Assembly instructions for this recipe are at the bottom, though you may wish to make the ganache and meringue mushrooms once you have filled the roll and left it to set.

Happy Holidays!

Buche de Noel

Chocolate Cloud Roll

¼ cup + 2 T sugar (divided) 

6 large eggs, separated 

4 oz. bittersweet chocolate, melted 

¾ tsp cream of tartar 

1 T unsweetened cocoa

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 17 x 12 jellyroll pan. Line the pan with foil, leaving overhangs on the long sides. Grease and then flour the foil (it is crucial that you do this well).

2. In a mixing bowl beat ¼ of the sugar with the egg yolks for five minutes, or until they are light and fluffy. Add the chocolate and beat until incorporated. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.

3. In a different bowl, beat the egg whites until foamy. Add the cream of tartar and beat until soft peaks form. Gradually add the remaining 2 T of sugar, beating until stiff peaks form when the beater is raised slowly.

4. Fold ¼ of the egg white mixture into the yolk mixture to lighten it. Gently fold the remaining whites into the yolks. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, spreading evenly with a spatula. Bake for 16 minutes, the cake will have puffed and will spring back when lightly pressed.

5. As soon as the cake is out of the oven, sprinkle it with the cocoa powder. Take a clean dish towel, wet it, and wring it out. Place the towel over the cake while it cools.

 

Whipped Cream

1 cup heavy cream 

2 T granulated sugar 

2 T cocoa powder 

1 tsp instant espresso powder 

½ tsp vanilla

1. Put all of the ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Stir to combine. Place the bowl and whisk attachment for your mixer in the fridge for at least 15 minutes.

2. Using a mixer set on medium speed, whip the cream to soft peaks.

 

Dark Chocolate Ganache

12 oz. bittersweet chocolate 

1 2/3 cup heavy cream 

2 T Frangelico

1. Break the chocolate into pieces. Place in the bowl of a food processor and process until very fine. Heat the cream to the boiling point. With the food processor running pour in the heated cream. Pulse until smooth. Transfer to a bowl and whisk in the Frangelico. Let cool until the ganache has reached a spreadable consistency (this can be expedited by putting it in the fridge or freezer, but watch it closely to make sure you don’t over cool it and have to start over.

 

Meringue Mushrooms

2 large egg whites 

¼ tsp cream of tartar 

½ cup + 1 T superfine sugar 

Cocoa powder for dusting

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. In a mixing bowl fitted with a clean whisk attachment, whip the egg whites until frothy. Add the cream of tartar and beat on medium speed while gradually adding 2 T of the sugar. When soft peaks form add 1 more T of sugar and increase speed to high. When stiff peaks form gradually beat in the remaining sugar.

2. Using a pastry  bag fitted with a ½ inch tip (for me this was just a bear coupler), pipe mushroom caps and stems onto a baking sheet lined with a silpat or parchment. To pipe stems, keep the bag close to the sheet, rising slowly while squeezing, so that domes form. Use the tip of the bag to smooth any point that remains when you remove the tip. To pipe stems, start close to the sheet and rise quickly, so that you pipe tapered columns that end in a point.

3. Bake in the oven for 45 minutes to an hour, until meringue is crisp. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely.

4. Dust the caps with cocoa powder. To assemble mushrooms, I just stuck the pointy end of the stems straight into the bases of the caps. Others suggest piping a little raw meringue or using chocolate to hold these together.

 

Assembly

1. Lifting with the foil overhang, gently slide the cake from the pan onto the counter.

2. Spread the whipped cream evenly over the cake

3. Beginning with the side closest to you, Use the foil to lift one edge of the cake and begin to roll it. As you go check to make sure the cake is not sticking to the foil. If this goes unchecked it will remove large strips from your cake. If any parts of the cake do come lose (mine did), use a little bit of whipped cream to stick them back on.

4. Once the cake is rolled, put it in the fridge for an hour to set.

5. Remove the cake from the fridge. Cutting at a diagonal, remove 5-6 inches from the cake. This will be used to make the branch.

6. Spread ganache over the cake. Try to use a light touch. Especially when it comes to the ends. Place some extra ganache where you want the branch to go on, and place the branch there, pressing it into the ganache. Cover the branch in ganache as well. Remember this is supposed to look like a log, so the ganache doesn’t need to be perfectly smooth or even.

7. Use the times of a fork to make a grain pattern in the frosting. At the ends and top of the knot move the fork in a circle. Cover and refrigerate until one hour before serving. Only attach the meringue mushrooms just before serving.

8. Serve

Pound Cake

I finally got a copy of Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, and wanted to try making something from the famed book. Since I didn’t really have an occasion to make anything fancy, I decided to make her Perfect Pound Cake. I decided to make the marbled variation, with the addition of a little almond extract. I have to say, this pound cake was good, but I wouldn’t call it perfect. I’m not entirely sure that I can say what was missing, although I didn’t think it was quite moist enough. I also thought that the outside of the loaf got a little too crisp, but it certainly didn’t reach the point of burning, so I can’t complain much. The main failing may have been my use of inferior (Kroger brand) butter. The book recommends using the best butter you can find, and using something of better quality probably would have improved the flavor. On the plus side, this recipe is really fast to throw together. Overall it was good, but I think I’ll keep searching for a favorite.

Dorie Greenspan’s Perfect Pound Cake

2 cups all purpose flour 

1 tsp baking powder 

¼ tsp salt

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature 

1 cup sugar

4 large eggs, room temperature 

1 tsp vanilla extract 

½ tsp almond extract 

4 oz. bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Butter a 9 x 5 loaf pan. In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment beat together the butter and sugar for five minutes.

2. While the butter is beating, in a separate bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt

3. Turn the mixer up to medium speed. Add the eggs to the butter mixture one at a time, beating for 1-2 minutes after each addition, and regularly scraping down the sides. Add the vanilla and almond extract along with the last egg.

4. Fold the flour mixture gently into the butter mixture. Divide the batter in half, and add half of it to the chocolate. Fold the batter and the chocolate together.

5. Spoon the batters into the loaf pan using large spoonfuls, alternating regular and chocolate batters. Once all of the batter is in the pan, swirl a butter knife through the cake, this will make it marble. Smooth the top of the cake.

6. Place the loaf pan on an insulated cookie sheet, or on two regular cookie sheets placed one inside the other. Bake the pound cake for 70-75 minutes, or until a knife stuck into the middle comes out clean.

7. Take the cake out of the oven and let it rest in its pan on a cooling rack for 30 minutes. Run a blunt knife around the edges of the pan, and invert to remove the cake. Let it cool to room temperature.

One Year in the Making.

This weekend I made a cake that has taken me close to year to develop. I came up with the idea back when there was a cupcake roundup based on reinvention, coming up with a cupcake based upon something else. I tossed some ideas around, and came up with the idea of a Snickers cupcake. Of course, this became immediately problematic, seeing as at the time I didn’t know how to make nougat, or caramel. As it turns out, it doesn’t seem like many people know how to make nougat, it’s not a very common thing. As my cooking skills developed, I tried making my own snickers bars a couple of times. At first I tried the recipe from Chow.com. The bars came out ok, but I thought both the nougat and the caramel turned out too hard though (sort of tooth brakingly hard). A made a second attempt based on the recipe from Recipe Gullet. The nougat from this recipe was way too soft and crumbly, it wouldn’t hold together. What I did learn from both of these attempts is that nougat sets fast. This ultimately convinced me that cupcakes might be impossible, because the nougat would harden before it could be divided into individual cupcakes.

That led me to the idea of a snickers cake. The cake is comprised of a layer of flourless chocolate cake, a layer of nougat, and a layer of caramel mousse, all topped off with chocolate ganache. The result was delicious. I found it was best to treat the cake as if it were an ice cream cake. When it came to room temperature, the mousse was too soft to stay together. I’ve included a number of suggestions on the assembly learned from my mistakes. Unfortunately I haven’t tried them myself, so I can’t swear that they will help. Unfortunately the pictures of this didn't end up super appetizing, because I was taking them while trying to serve the cake at a party. Trust me that it was good.

I should add that this cake was inspired by my mother, whose favorite candy bar is the Snickers.

Snickers Cake

Makes 1 ten inch cake

Flourless Chocolate Cake

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, cut into pieces
8 ounces semisweet chocolate chips (about 1 1/2 cups)
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 cup sifted unsweetened cocoa powder
6 large eggs

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Butter a ten inch spring-form pan and line the bottom with parchment. Melt the butter and chocolate over low heat in a saucepan. Once it is melted, put it aside.

2. Sift together the sugar and the cocoa powder. Whisk in the eggs until fully combined.

3. Pour the Chocolate mixture into the egg mixture. Whisk to combine. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan.

4. Bake the cake for 40-45 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean.

5. Let the cake cool completely. Run a knife around the edge of the cake, and remove the outside of the pan.

6. I removed the top third of the cake which I found was a little crusty. I was hoping to use this layer for the top of the cake, but it promptly fell apart. I still thought that this left the better part of the cake for the base, so I recommend it. DO NOT REMOVE THE CAKE FROM THE BASE OF THE SPRINGFORM PAN.

7. Butter the ring of the springform pan (I didn’t do this part, and the nougat stuck, even to my non-stick pan), and put the ring back around the cake. Set aside.

Nougat

This didn’t end up quite like a nougat because it wasn’t aerated enough. I don’t know if this was because I increased the number of egg whites, the decreased temperature of the sugar, (both attempts to make the nougat softer), or because I didn’t whip it enough after the sugar went in (trying to use it before the nougat set and couldn’t be spread without destroying the cake). Either way, it still tasted like it should have, just not quite the right texture.

¾ cup granulated sugar
½ cup light corn syrup
¼ cup water
2 large egg whites
½ cup crunchy peanut butter
½ tsp vanilla

1. Mix the sugar, water, and corn syrup in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Begin heating the mixture over medium high heat.

2. The goal is to get the egg whites to stiff peaks at around the same time the sugar reaches 266 degrees. I would start whipping the egg whites when the sugar shows around 200 degrees on the candy thermometer.

3. Once the egg whites are at stiff peaks, and the sugar syrup is at 266 degrees, with the mixer still on high speed, pour the sugar into the egg white mixture in a thin stream. Continue beating on high speed to aerate.

4. Add the peanut butter and vanilla with the mixer still on. Once combined, turn off the mixer and pour the nougat onto the cake in the spring-form pan. Spread the nougat very gently, or you will risk tearing the cake apart. Set aside. Once the nougat is cool, run a knife around the inside edge to make sure it hasn’t stuck to the sides of the pan.

Caramel Mousse

1 cup sugar
¼ cup water
4 Tbs ( ½ stick) salted butter
2 cups heavy cream, divided
1 cup lightly salted peanuts.

1. Put ½ cup of the heavy cream into a small saucepan or a microwave safe bowl. Reserve the remaining cream in the fridge to whip later. Heat the cream, but do not boil it. This will help prevent the caramel from bubbling up later.

2. Combine the sugar and water in a heavy bottomed saucepan. Heat over medium high heat until the caramel reaches a uniform dark brown color.

3. Remove the caramel from the heat and pour in the heated cream, and the butter. Mix with a wooden spoon to prevent clumping. Set aside and allow the caramel to come to room temperature.

4. Whip the remaining 1 ½ cups of cream to stiff peaks. Mix 1/3 of the whipped cream into the caramel to lighten it. Pour the caramel into the remaining cream and fold to combine until it is uniform. Fold in the peanuts.

5. Pour the mousse over the nougat. Level with an offset spatula. Place the cake in the freezer to set, at least 30 minutes.

Chocolate Ganache

1 ½ cups semisweet chocolate

1 cup heavy cream

1. Combine the chocolate and the heavy cream in a microwave safe bowl. Microwave on medium power for 30 seconds, then let the mixture stand for 10 seconds before attempting to mix. Repeat until you are able to mix the cream and chocolate into a smooth and uniform mixture.

2. Let the ganache cool for ten minutes. While you are doing this remove the cake from the fridge and unmold it. Before removing the edges of the spring-form pan, you may want to run a knife along the inside to make sure nothing sticks, because if something does stick, you again risk tearing your cake apart.

3. Place the cake on a cooling rack set over a cookie sheet. Begin pouring the ganache over the cake. The ganache hardens pretty quickly once it hits the freezing cake, so work quickly, smoothing with an offset spatula as you go. To cover the sides of the cake, just pour some ganache near the edges and use your spatula to encourage the ganache to run down the sides (this is why the cookie sheet is there).

4. Put the whole thing back into the freezer until you are ready to serve.